Tuesday, December 10, 2019

Why Water Buffalo Theology?

One of the most intriguing books I read in the mid-1970s was Waterbuffalo Theology by Koyama Kosuke. In 1999 the 25th anniversary edition (revised & expanded) was published as Water Buffalo Theology. But what kind of theology is that?! 
First edition cover
Who was Koyama?
Koyama Kosuke was a Japanese theologian who was born 90 years ago today, on December 10, 1929. He was less than two months younger than C.S. Song, the Asian theologian I wrote about in October (see here), but unlike Song, who is still living, Koyama (and that is the family name) died in 2009 before his 80th birthday.
Koyama studied in the U.S. from 1952 until he finished his Ph.D. at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1959. During those years he met and married Lois Rozendaal, a Dutch-American woman. 
For most of the next decade (1960~68) he served as a pastor and teacher in Thailand, being sent there as a missionary by the United Church of Christ in Japan.
Following several years (1968~74) serving in Singapore and then in New Zealand (1974~79), in 1980 Koyama became a professor at Union Theological Seminary in New York. Upon his retirement in 1996 he became the John D. Rockefeller Jr. Professor Emeritus of World Christianity.
Why Did Koyama Write about Water Buffalos?
Koyama gained attention in the theological world after his seminal book Waterbuffalo Theology was published in 1974. But why did he write about water buffalos?
Because his first field of service after completing his Ph.D. was as a pastor in northern Thailand, Koyama recognized the need for communicating with the people in his congregation, many of whom were farmers who used water buffalos in their daily work. 
Thai farmer plowing with a water buffalo
In my 1/22/2010 blog article I wrote about the importance of contextual theology. Koyama’s development of contextualized theology in Thailand was one of the main examples I used in the theology courses I taught in the late 1970s, and afterward.
According to an article written soon after Koyama’s death in 2009 (see here), Donald Shriver, president emeritus of Union Seminary, said that Waterbuffalo Theology was “one of the first books truly to do theology out of the setting of Asian villages.”
In the same article, a historian for the Church of Christ in Thailand called Koyama’s book “one of the classic works of contemporary Asian theology.”
The article concludes with Shriver telling how someone at Union noticed that Waterbuffalo theology had landed on the discard pile outside the library. Apparently, a librarian had concluded that the prestigious school had no program for teaching theology to water buffalos.
But since Koyama was joining the faculty there, his book “was quickly and quietly returned to the shelves.”
What Can We Learn from Water Buffalo Theology?
After locating in New York, Koyama didn’t write about water buffalos anymore. He was in a different context, and his writing reflected that new setting.
Koyama’s second most important book is probably Mount Fuji and Mount Sinai: A Critique of Idols, which was published in 1985. His “context” then was the world threatened by nuclear war. He explained,
I have written this book with a keen awareness of the global peril of nuclear war. Wars are waged ‘in the name of God,’ that is, with ‘theological’ justification. Such justification is idolatry” (p. x).
The background “context” was the destruction of warring Japan in 1945. Koyama became a baptized Christian in 1942; three years later he saw Tokyo “become wilderness by the constant bombings.” And then, of course, there were the catastrophic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.
If Koyama were still writing today, perhaps he would applaud an article that appeared last week on the Rolling Stone website: “False Idol—Why the Christian Right Worships Donald Trump.”
That long article, which I recommend you taking the time to read (here), helps us understand the political context that challenges theologians, and all of us, today.

10 comments:

  1. I remember my Dad being asked to speak at rural churches (he wasn't much on that). He was the Bwana Mkuu, Dakitari, Mzungu. He told of growing up a farm-boy. They could relate. He spoke of hard times during the depression. They could also relate. He spoke of hard times, and of losing his big brother, and his need for Christ. They could relate.

    In my years of living, and meeting celebrities, I have found the real-life stories of hard times is open with the spouses. We all need Christ.

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    1. 1sojourner, I don't know what you mean about being "open with the spouses," but as a Christian I fully agree that we all need Christ.

      The problem Koyama faced in Thailand was similar in many ways, perhaps, to the problem your father faced in East Africa. How do you teach people about their need for Christ if they are perhaps illiterate and have little knowledge of or interest in the Judaeo-Christian story rooted in the Middle East?

      One good way to do that is through telling personal stories as your father did--and telling and listening to stories as Koyama did in northern Thailand in the 1960s.

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    2. Celebrities have to maintain their facade. Spouse are more open about real life - joys and struggles.

      Troubles and struggles seem to be common to the human experience - even those with a good facade. Once the facade is down, it is amazing how human many are - especially if one does not see them as a celebrity.

      Given that, I am more impressed each year with the incarnation of God. He came into creation with all of it trouble, and lived it Himself.

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  2. Thank you for this article. I’m finding your blogs about contextual theology very interesting.

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    1. Thanks, Anton. I am pleased that you find my blog about contextual theology interesting.

      In spite of the widespread, and often accurate, criticism of Christian missionary work often being "imperialistic," there has been a long, although minority, movement toward what used to be called indigenization, what Roman Catholics often call enculturation, and what Protestants for the last 50 years or so has often called contextualization. All such efforts are based on the idea that the Christian message should be planted and nourished in local cultures rather than transplanted from the churches within "Christendom."

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  3. Thinking Friend John Carr in California wrote saying that he wishes I had explained Water Buffalo theology. 

    It would take a lot of words (and time) to explain Koyama's theology in detail. In general, though, as scholar John Eggen wrote in 2006, Koyama believed that "theology must be able to culturally express Christianity in terms that carry both the form and meaning of the Gospel message, while rooting itself within the culture, and thus allowing the Gospel to prophetically interpret, challenge, and change that culture and be fully understood by the believers."

    Koyama's 1974 book gives various examples of how Koyama sought to do that in Thailand in the 1960s. My interest is not in how he did that there then but how we do the same sort of thing where we each are now.

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  4. Local Thinking Friend Temp Sparkman wrote,

    "Leroy, did your friend’s theology follow categories like Trinity, Creation, Sin & Salvation, or was it more like a practical, narrative theology?

    Like you, I wonder how he would have dealt with the evangelical Trump idolatry.

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    1. Thanks for your question and comment, Temp.

      To briefly answer your question, Koyama's theology was not at all an attempt to develop a "systematic" theology but was definitely more of a practical, narrative nature.

      Since, as one scholar wrote, Koyama sought "to criticize, reform, dethrone, or oppose culture if it is found to be against what the name of Jesus Christ stands for," I think it is pretty clear that he would express strong criticism of "the evangelical Trump idolatry."

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  5. Contextual theology animates a lively controversy in the news as a church in California put up a nativity scene with Joseph, Mary, and baby Jesus in three separate cages. As far as I know, no one used the phrase "contextual theology" but the powerful reactions on all sides showed that the message got through loud and clear. If you have not seen the picture, here is a link to ABC News reporting the story: https://abcnews.go.com/US/california-church-nativity-depicts-jesus-mary-joseph-cages/story?id=67604774

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    1. Craig, I am late (again) in responding to your comments, but, yes, I think the nativity scene you linked to is an example of contextual theology that Koyama would have resonated with. Thanks for posting the link, which I hope many of the readers of this blog accessed.

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